


And the Band Plays On

by AceQueenKing



Category: VERNON Ursula - Works
Genre: Gen, Jackalope Wives, Magic, Trick or Treat: Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-10-31
Updated: 2018-10-31
Packaged: 2019-08-08 06:52:58
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 727
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/16424489
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AceQueenKing/pseuds/AceQueenKing
Summary: The fire crackles and pops and for a precious time, they’re just two jackalopes, bounding along the hill behind the house and dancing at the beat of their own drumbeat. Every foot-print is a part of the song, and she and Eva both sing along to the primordial melody of their hearts, hoping it reaches their sisters in the woods.





	And the Band Plays On

**Author's Note:**

  * For [DesertScribe](https://archiveofourown.org/users/DesertScribe/gifts).



Grandma Harken remembers dancing.

Not the human's sort of dancing, no; Harken's never been the kind for that. It's too restrained, that sort of thing, the delicate swish and sway. It reminds her only of loss, only of the Father of Rabbits and the father of her daughter. Grandma Harken doesn’t dwell in the past.

It’s not in her wild nature.

She harrumphs when her daughter’s boy, the one with just about zero sense and just a slightly wider lick of magic, gets dressed up for the Hallow’s Eve dance. He’s wearing black and white, some crude little get-up, and he makes Eva grin while he's dancing like he’s some scary painted thing.

Grandma Harken’s seen the things that are scary, out in the high forests and hills. They don’t need to puff themselves up – they know what they are, and they need no warning.

“Let him be,” Eva hisses in warning, and she does, because Eva is no fool for anything but this boy and Grandma Harken is no fool for anyone but Eva.

“Bye, mama! Bye Grandma!” He hugs them both and he’s gone out into the night. After the jackalope wife he’d nearly brought home the year before, she’d been wary of the boy, but he was seeking only mortal appetites now and she allowed that.

She watched him go, then gathered her shawl to her shoulders.

“Let’s go outside,” she says, and Eva looks at her with a raised brow.  She swats her arm lightly. “Don’t look at me like that. I’m old, Eva, I ain’t delicate.”

Eva laughs and leads the way, pulling a shawl around her arms.

***

In the eve of the midnight hour, Eva and Grandma Harken pull firewood onto the fire. Old kindling and tiny sticks, old pallet boxes and strong wood half-saved through difficult winters. “Mother,” Eva says, holding out a match, and Grandma Harken does the honors.

It ignites in the midnight hour, all blaze and glory and bright. Eva taps her foot ‘round the fire and Grandma Harken whoops.

It’s easy in the midnight hour to pull on an old blanket, not quite the old skin, but close enough that in the blurred light it looks like it might be what she once was. She turns and whoops and cries out and in the blurring lines of the midnight hour, her legs flex and she leaps and she dances like a maid half her age.

Eva never learned the way to dance, wasn’t born a wild thing, but she gets up and dances with her mother, all stretching legs and hopping feet. Not quite human, not quite not, but altogether more than the sum of her parts.

While the boy is off chasing girls, Eva and Grandma Harken dance under the pale October moon. It doesn’t last too long; soon the boy will be home, soon the witching hour will close and she’ll just be an old woman with a shawl and a spot of magic that’s no good for anything but trouble.

The fire crackles and pops and for a precious time, they’re just two jackalopes, bounding along the hill behind the house and dancing at the beat of their own drumbeat. Every foot-print is a part of the song, and she and Eva both sing along to the primordial melody of their hearts, hoping it reaches their sisters in the woods. They'll never know if it does or not, the Jackalopes too far away to make their way to them before the witching hour comes to a close. 

But that’s alright. Every song has to end, after all. When the midnight hour comes crashing down, the door closes, and she’s just an old lady with bad knees and funny legs and a childhood out in a place they don’t name. Eva helps her go back to her seat by the door, and they watch as the children come streaming home, including their boy.

The boy comes home, his chalk-paint all smeared, as he talks about a human girl in witches' clothing and the way she danced. Ain’t nothing magic about that, but that’s for the better, Grandma Harken thinks. Eva and Grandma Harken give one another knowing looks, while the boy sighs and dances to the tune of his own wordless rhythm.

And somewhere, out in the wide hills, the Jackalope wives play on.


End file.
